Today I read some of the letters I've written to Amy Ryan and Ian Prowell (while he was an exchange student in Japan).  I was drawn into the letters I had written, just as I always seem to be when I read something I wrote that I've haven't read for a while.  It made me realize I should make another entry into this journal of mine, intended for a daily account of my life and thoughts; now defunct, becoming an occasional thing, updates every couple of months.  So much has happened since December 3, like always happens when I neglect this computer file and it's subsequent journal.  Just thinking about what to write conjures up images of the richness of life, particually mine-everything I've done and seen and heard, knowing that there is no way to reproduce everything, knowing I'll forget something before I finally get back to this file once again.

Just now, at this exact moment, I think I pinned why I like so much to read these letters and other things I've written about myself.  Besides just the joy of reading what I wrote, seeing how beautiful I think it is, whether another would agree, it's the truthfullness of it, the actual depiction of my life, the struggles, the joys, the triumph, the defeats, everything personafied in little more than words.  I cannot express how wonderful it feels to read this stuff, knowing that that constituted me at that point in time, especially my subconsious, since that is where my words arise from when I write.  It is the fact that what I read is fact, an actual person's depiction of fact, and that that viewer is me, myself, none else.  It is that I see myself from my words, see myself looking out upon the world, go back in time, relive what once was, feeling the pain, the longing.  Knowing what it is like to question my love? for April Brown, my excitement at graduation, my joy at writing...What is life? For me, seeing these words, reading them.  Once more becoming the person these words personified, that is life.  That is what makes writing this worth it, that is why I do this thing.

So much to tell, I can't think of where to begin.  I know it's an oft used phrase, but I can think of none better to say, none better to relate to you, Glen Vomacka, whoever you are now, when you read this, no knowing where you are, how old you are, or if this is even you, perhaps it is some historian, discovering a computer or disk clutching this file to it's proverbial chest of technology.  Who knows?  For all, it can mean something, a glimpse into the past, of how things really were for at least one person , and in a world where the individual is meant to count, that must mean the world to everyone.  Not being bravado or self righteous, or whatever, but that is how I see it, that is how I want it to be seen.

December 94, I remember nothing of that month, save some school bits, and winter break.  Finals were fine.  Upon leaving my Philosophy and Government classes, for the last time, I was called by the teacher.  Myself, I recall, did not realize at the time it would be the last I saw of those two women, at least in that class, timeframe, or perhaps ever again.  Now I look back, as I did a week or so after, and realized the look in their eyes, as they thanked me for being in the class, and tried to say more as I left-at least Lucy Dagget I am sure wanted too, I think maybe Linda Collins (Gov't) said all she needed-a acknowledgment that I could come to her for any recommendations.  I would later need such, but got it from Martin Houser(Math 60, Calc II), but that comes much later from here, holds no place now.  Christmas break saw the visitation of Amy Ryan, my farewell to Erin Rybolt, and my farewell to Sarah McAdam.  This is the first I have thought of those two wonderful, nay, beautiful individuals, since then.  Erin went back to South Dekota, I believe, with her fiance, and Sarah moved to the east coast with her family-either Virginia or Pennsylvania, I can't recall which she said, one was a visit, the other her new home.  I knew Sarah ever since junior high, and now feeling of sorrow washes over me, as I realize, for the first time, that yet another friend has left me, most likely forever.  High School was the most incredibly wonderful time of life, yet graduation was most possibly the culmination of that time, it was also the declination point of my life.  Ever since that night, life was different, people left, and, now, once again, those same feelings of something good being lost forever washes over my poor heart, and I grieve, yes, most definitely do I grieve, for the past is done, as it is always, but this past is a circle, yesterday a new circle from the past four years, even the past 18 or so. Graduation marked the beginning of a new circle, ending when I leave LMC, but overlapping my parents lifespan, my sister's love, my sister's recent marriage, and all other major plot-lines of my life that shall not end with my leaving Antioch, with simply my moving to a new place, for these are the circles that matter most, the ones of substantial feeling of affection, of love, of joy and togeetherness, of completeness.  Those are the pasts that count, that truly matter.  Now, one of those pasts is long gone, and I shall forever regret high school, even as much as I cherish it and the memories and the friends.  It is not my place to mourn the past, however, only to live the life I see before me, and to build and embelish the path my feet set upon. Still, I cannot help mourn at least some, without it, I make this part of my lige frivilous, superfulous, meaningless, and that I refuse to do.  I give evidence with my writings of it even now, here, today at this panel of letters, numbers and symbols that make up my language and methods of thought.  Yes, the past I love, but the present and the future I live.

December 25th, 1994, I did something I waited a long time for, a joyride in a golf cart late at night, completely unauthorized.  I took Erin and Amy, my Christmas gift to them, and we drove a cart around the course one time.  I had left the cart house unlocked before closing the day before Christmas, opening it and taking out a cart.  Amy brought her camera, and she recently sent me pictures back.  This note and pictures she sent prompted my letter to her, and eventually led to my reading the other letters to her and Ian.  After that adventure, we went out and I bought the two desert at Lions restaurant, my treat.  "The night started on me, and it shall end on me," I said to their protests over my wallet. I won out, and they thanked me.

Erin would leave not much more than a week and a half later, and so would I.  I spent New Years Eve with Amy, who happened to call me that night, asking if I was doing anything.  I told her I wasn't, since I didn't see the day as any special thing.  It was simply another day, and I already try to squeeze the most from each day, most of the time, anyways.  The passing of a year is no big deal to me, just the transgression to another day.  I was just going to go to bed, not staying up to watch the ball drop or any of the shows, or anything like that.  However, Amy wanted to do something, so I picked her up, and we came back to my house.  We played cards and talked and just were friends again for awhile-something we never even did a whole lot in high school.  The night passed pleasantly, and we both had a farely good time.

I had nothing I had, or wanted, to do over break, so Amy invited me up to Wahington, to see her at college.  I think at first it might have been a joke, uttered before we went to see a movie together upon her returning for break. Later that night we went by to see Erin, and about 10PM or so, I hadn't seen her for such a long time-she'd been in North Platte with her fiance all since graduation.  We all the went out to the Coffee Cavern, a coffee shop next to Target made to look like a cave.  With Amy's invitation, however, I took it seriously, whether it was meant that way or not, and she carried out the idea, whether serious at first or not.  So it was that I found myself changing the oil and engine coolant in my car for the trip.  My oil was coming up on it's   5000 mark, and needed changing.  My coolant would not withstand the frigid, freezing whether.  Despite my parents reluctance to allow me to go, in the winter, by myself, and several others "wisdom" that I should not go, I left.  I drove straight to Spokane on the way there, a straight 15 hour trek, through central Oregon.  I arrived at 10 PM, in Spokane, wolfed down some grub at a McDonalds that was still amazing open inside.  Funny side note-there was another guy there who initiated a conversation.  I told him I was tired, and he agreed.  Long day at work I think he said, I said a long day of driving. He asked from where, and when I said the San Fransisco area, I either gained respect or his belief that I was crazy.

I spent four days, five nights at Whitworth College, and I really enjoyed my time.  I ate at the cafeteria, Amy graciously paying for me on her much inflated meal plan(she had like 60 meals left over).  I stayed in "Mac" hall, the all guy dorm, with Amy's ex-boyfriend, her only second such.  They had fallen into disfavor, and, even with my full consent and approval (not that she needed or wanted it), she put me up with him to play me off of him, in hopes of bringing him to his senses.  It never did work, and Bryan didn't makes grades during the winter intersession-getting kicked out(he was already on academic probation).  I went to a dance, the Jammy-Jam.  Contrary to the name, only three or four people went in pajamas, two of the girls and the guy I went with. The guy's name was Bryce, from Juno Alaska.  I would spend two nights in his room, as I stayed out late watching Gone with the Wind with other students in one of Warren Halls lobbies, and went to the dance another night-Mac was locked, and I didn't have the key to get in.

I went with Amy and Kristen, her roomate, also from Alaska, to a nearby ice skating rink/fun park.  We rode a carousal, like the one at Santa Cruz, with rings-to toss in a plastic clowns mouth-I got one in!  We also went skating for a while, and, as I did not fall, I termed the endevour a success.(I hadn't skated for about a decade, since Dublin.)  I did a little driving around the city, to see a few things, but not too much, mainly just to keep my car warm.  The day before I left, Sunday, I actually went with Amy to church.  She insisted, and, since she was putting me up with friends, paying for my food, and had even invited me up to begin with, I complied.  It wasn't a bad experience.  I won't complain, because it is good to look at all sides of an issue, and not to choose anything blindly.  I am an agnostric, as stated I'm sure several other places in this journal, but not based on blind sight.  I've been to church, read parts of the bible, and examined the aspect of a deity.  It is based on my opinion, after these examinationsm, that there is no God.  I might, however, be wrong-I won't know for sure until I die, and, unless there is an afterlife, I'll really never know either way.  The point is, I went to church again, and Amy thanked me, so that was worth it.  She didn't pry into me on the issue, and didn't really say anything to me about it, which I respected.  In fact, I was the one to say something-something about it not being so bad, or short and sweet.

I forget when I went to the skating rink.  I also forget when I took Amy and Kristen grocery shopping, but I did.  They both piled into me little Fiero, and I took them to the store, where they bought a few foodstuffs-they had miny fridges in the dorm rooms up there.

All in all, it was truly a rewarding experience, and I am glad I had the opportunity.  It was neat to experience dorm life-a little taste before I leave home.  On the way back, I took my time, visiting Seattle and Portland, and taking the long way-Highways 101 and 1, along the California Coastline.  I even got gas in Arcata, and drove by the campus of CSU Humboldt, imagining myself going there the next fall.  For some reason, I wasn't as impressed with Arcata as I was before, I really have no idea why.  It simply s eemed less exciting as it had been the first time up at the campus.  I didn't want to go there as much as I once had.

I really liked Seattle-went up the Space Needle, took a lot of pictures-in fact, I photographed the whole trip, and got some really good shots I think.  I walked around downtown, enjoying the sights.  The first day, Monday, on the way there, I got pulled over for speeding by a police officer.  I was doing 78 in a 65 zone(interstate), and he pulled me over.  I got off the road really quick, and complied with everything he said. He asked me where I was headed, and I said Seattle.  He asked where I was from, and I said Spokane.  Upon asking my business in Washington, I told him I was visiting friends, and, I think he felt sorry for me, seeing my bags and everything in the passenger seat.  He let me go with just telling me to slow down for him.  I didn't know that at first-I thought I might get a ticket in the mail.  However, I did slow down, not doing more than 6 or 7 miles over the limit the whole way home.  When I got to Seattle, I tried to forget about it, and succeeded farely well-drove around, getting really lost.  I didn't mind though, I wanted to see the city. Everything seemed really crammed together, and, as a matter of fact, Seattle looked a lot like San Fransico, in a way.  I liked it though, stayed a night in a Travel Lodge Hotel ($55!).  I couldn't find any cheap hotels, and got frustrated.  The next day I checked out early and walked around some more-seeing the small park they had spanning the interstate(I-5).  It was really nice, and I took a lot of pictures.  I also saw the Seattle Art Museum. They had an exhibit on Benini Art, from Africa, which I found really interesting.  However, I didn't have a whole lot of time, wanting to get as far south as possible before stopping-I didn't spend a lot of time on the rest of the museum.

Finally leaving Seattle, I made my way to Portland, getting there about 3 or 4 in the afternoon.  I didn't know if I was going to stay a night, but after driving around for a while, I didn't.  I didn't like Portland.  Compared to Seattle, it seemed dark and dirty.  I might have given it a bad rap, it was late and I was anxious to get on my way.  I walked around for a while in the downtown district, but still got the same impression of filth and darkness, so I left Portland.  I stayed the night in a little town, in a hotel.  The rain had been incredible on the road, and I probably should've stopped earlier. I wanted to get some miles on, though.